The Mahājanapadas were sixteen kingdoms and aristocratic republics that existed in ancient India from the sixth to fourth centuries BCE, during the second urbanisation period.
Pottery of the Northern Black Polished Ware culture (c. 500–200 BCE)
Silver coin of Avanti mahajanapada (4th century BCE)
Coin of Early Gandhara Janapada: AR Shatamana and one-eighth Shatamana (round), Taxila-Gandhara region, c. 600–300 BCE
Coin of Takshashila portraying a tree flanked by a hill surmounted by a crescent and a Nandipada above a swastika.
Anatomically modern humans are estimated to have first arrived on the Indian subcontinent between 73,000 and 55,000 years ago. The earliest known human remains in South Asia date to 30,000 years ago.
Mahajanapadas
…The Mahājanapadas were sixteen kingdoms and aristocratic republics that existed in ancient India from the sixth to fourth centuries BCE, during the second urbanisation period. The 6th–5th centuries BCE are often regarded as a major turning point in early Indian history. During this period, India's first large cities…
Mesolithic rock art at the Bhimbetka rock shelters, Madhya Pradesh, showing a wild animal, perhaps a mythical one, attacking human hunters. Although the rock art has not been directly dated, it has been argued on circumstantial grounds that many paintings were completed by 8000 BCE, and some slightly earlier.
A dolmen erected by Neolithic people in Marayur, Kerala, India.
Stone Age (6,000 BCE) carvings of Edakkal Caves in Kerala, India.
Mehrgarh site in present-day Balochistan, Pakistan.